RAPIDINHAS

In less than one week PC's story had changed from the deadly result of a romantic tryst turned sour into an intriguing and mysterious scheme that included, spies, treason and maybe political motivation to silence for ever a man who knew too much for his own good. Rotund PC, who had become Brazil's butt of jokes with his bald head and a comic mustache, was killed in his bedroom at his beachfront house in Maceió, state of Alagoas.

The murder happened June 23, a Sunday morning. A few hours later, Alagoas Justice secretary Rubens Quintela announced that the crime had been committed by Farias's girlfriend, Suzana Marcolino da Silva, 28, who after having killed the lover turned the gun against herself.

A few days later the Federal Police took over the case, and a version circulated by weekly newsmagazine Isto É cited witnesses guaranteeing that Suzana had been killed by one of the bodyguards who always accompany Farias. Some people believe in a theory that the crime was committed by hit men probably paid by former President Collor de Mello. Jeffrey Hoff, an American historian who has been studying the PC case for four years, thinks that this death is part of a bigger plot to eliminate all of those who know too much about Collorgate.

According to another version he was eliminated by a Cuban hitman hired by a group of businessmen because he refused to return the money received from these people. Suzana was killed only because she was on the wrong place at the wrong time. Other theories see the crime as a family feud and there is also the version in which Suzana is seen as the hired gun to do PC in. Farias was so afraid of being killed that he wouldn't go any place without his bodyguards and kept his bullet-proof jacket even at the beach. As it happens with celebrities who die in Brazil the obituary doesn't seem quite complete before there is a couple of jokes about the deceased.

PC's body wasn't quite cold yet when the jokers started their act. Cartoonist Ziraldo, a guest on "Jô Soares Onze e Meia," Brazil's most popular nightly TV talk show, recalled a joke he had heard about PC and Dinho, the leader of a very popular band who recently died in a plane crash: "Do you know what Dinho told PC when he got to heaven? Nothing. PC didn't go to heaven."

Isto É: http://www.folha.com.br

São Paulo's city council is looking for a paranormal to help the legislators find out about alleged ghosts who have been spooking the downtown Câmara Municipal building. For years now cleaning workers have complained of screams and sounds of dragging chains and the appearance of dead people in the elevators during the night . The stories gained a fresh credibility since councilman Faria Lima, a respected legislator, revealed his own encounter with the unknown a night he stayed until midnight in the building for some overtime. He swears that he heard people disputing in a strange language in a room next to his own cabinet. When he summoned the security personnel, however, they couldn't find anyone. Faria Lima himself had accused the workers of wild imagination. "Now, I am not sure anymore," he said. Barring a better explanation, ghost experts credit the phenomenon to the fact that the building was erected in a place that once housed slaves many of whom were flogged to death.

"How not to call your child" would be an appropriate name for a still-untitled book authored by anthropologist Mário Souto Maior, 76, from the state of Pernambuco. The volume to be published in October promises to bring more than 2,000 names from simply funny to outrageously embarrassing (at least for those so named). The names were culled from phone books, news stories and lists published by newspapers. Among the precious findings there are names such as Naída Navinda Navolta Pereira (Going Coming Returning Pereira), Natal Carnaval, Vírgula (Comma), and one unforgettable: Último Prazer do Casal Almeida (Last Pleasure of the Couple Almeida).

Randas Batista, an until-recently unknown surgeon from Campina Grande do Sul in the state of Paraná, is becoming a household name throughout the world. The New York Times in its June-14 edition talked about his work as a revolution in heart surgery. Dr. Batista was also interviewed by Barbara Walters in the program 20/20 and his accomplishment was cited by magazine Newsweek on its June 24th edition. What the Brazilian physician has done in the last two years in a surgery that he calls ventriculoplastia redutora. The technique, which has been applied by him with success to 350 patients, consists in the cut of a piece of the left ventricle, the heart's main pumping chamber. The treatment is indicated for people with circulatory problems caused by heart dilatation. Up to know the only solution was a heart transplant. Another big plus for the new treatment is the price: a transplant can cost as much as $50,000 while Dr. Batista's technique costs a mere $2,000.

Ipanema, the celebrated Rio's neighborhood that gave us the song of the girl of the same name and the string bikini, is now in the pole position on the information superhighway. The InternetBar Deli has become the first Brazilian bar to offer on its menu connections to the Internet and the WEB. If the idea works the project should become a franchise very soon. Initially most clients have been foreigners living in Brazil who found a much cheaper way to connect to friends and relatives in their countries. The bar charges $10 for a half-hour connection. A telephone call for the same time would cost anywhere from $40 to $60. Better yet, promotions such as a Netscape sandwich (roast beef) plus the half hour connection cost a mere $11. For those willing to reach the Ipanema bar their site address is: http://netbar.riosoft.softex.br or you can send E-mail to: bbj@riosoft.softex.br

It was Gaúcho (from Rio Grande do Sul) Marco Antônio de Ávila who found out that the real Oscar winner for best sound track this year should be Italian Sergio Endrigo and not Argentinean Luis Enrique Bacalov. Bacalov was awarded the prize for the song "Nelle Mie Notti" from the film Il Postino (The Mailman) but the music wasn't his. The plagiarism was revealed by the Italian daily Il Messagero after Ávila, a recording shop owner, saw the film and recognized the song from La Voce Dell'Uomo, an Endrigo LP from 1975. In Rome, the Brazilian showed the song to Giancarlo Dotto who took the case to maestro Mario Bortolotto. He found eight identical measures just at the introduction of the melody. Six would be enough to characterize plagiarism. Endrigo finally went to see the movie and he couldn't believe what his former disciple, Bacalov, had done. As for Ávila he declared, "Endrigo has always been an idol to me. Now, he has also become a friend."

Despite the fact that it doesn't have snow, Brazil is becoming one of the world's biggest suppliers of top-notch skiers. Brazilian professional skier Christian Blanco has a good chance to compete at the Winter Olympics in 1998 in Nagano, Japan. Some of the best sky instructors in Colorado are also Brazilian. While only 400 Brazilians went to snow resorts in 1990, this number has increased now almost 100 fold with more than 30,000 going to the slippery snowy slopes of Europe and North and South America. More than that, Brazilian entrepreneurs are making money with snow. Do you know who is the owner of Silver Creek, the private ski station in Colorado? Brazilian Marise Cipriano, the daughter of Omar Fontana, the man who owns international airline carrier Transbrasil. Together with her husband Antônio Celso she invested $12 million to convert Silver Creek into the tropical skiers' paradise.

Brazil's Health Ministry is importing hundreds of thousands of snuglier condoms in order to make more appealing the supply of the product for their younger clients. Teenagers had been complaining for some time about the size of the prophylactic they have been offered. The new condoms are being imported from China and have a 49 mm diameter instead of the standard 53. Explains Lair Guerra Macedo, coordinator of the AIDS and Sexual Transmissible Diseases Program, "The sexual organ of a 12 year old boy is not yet developed to wear adult camisinhas (Venus's little shirts)."

Febem, the Fundação para o Bem-Estar do Menor (Foundation for the Well-Being of Minors) is a small city with close to 3,000 children spread through its three main institutions. In these reformatories children have developed their own language with many terms to paint the more sordid side of life.
Acochar -- to embrace
Bagulho -- drug or a robbery's spoils
Banca -- gang
Barraco -- room
Bobo -- (dunce) clock
Boi -- (ox) bandit
Bronca -- crime
Caô-caô -- lie
Chico doce -- (sweet Chico) nightstick
Coró -- police district
Coruja -- (owl) briefs
Desandar -- to become gay
Estar Ben Johnson -- to be on drugs
Fazer -- (to do) to steal
Goma -- house
Grinfa -- syringe
Jega -- bed
Jumbo -- personal bag
Lady -- woman
Ligar-se no que pira -- to know what's happening
Moçada -- homosexuals
Pegar o bonde -- (to take the streetcar) to be transferred
Truta -- buddy
Xerife -- the leader